How can Copilot cloud agent be instructed to preserve references in a PR body?

[harupy]

🏷️ Discussion Type

Question

💬 Feature/Topic Area

Copilot Cloud Agent

Body

In our repository, .github/instructions/cloud-agent.instructions.md has applyTo: "**" and asks Copilot cloud agent to preserve task references (issue, PR, CI, and documentation links) when creating or updating a PR description. The generated PR body sometimes drops them.

Do path-specific .instructions.md files apply to PR body generation and subsequent updates, or only to matched code files? What supported way can reliably guide the cloud agent’s PR title/body content?

[harupy]

@nirav-gajera

.instructions.md files with applyTo: "**" apply primarily to code generation, not PR metadata (title/body).

Where is this documented?

[harupy]

This comment looks like a duplicate

[TongyiDai]

The documentation supports a narrower conclusion than the earlier replies. Path-specific .github/instructions/*.instructions.md files apply when Copilot is working in the context of files matched by applyTo. A generated PR title/body is not a repository file path, so applyTo: "**" is not a reliable contract for PR metadata.

For instructions that should apply to the whole coding-agent task, use the documented repository-wide file .github/copilot-instructions.md (or an applicable AGENTS.md) and repeat critical references in the task prompt itself. A PR template can provide structure, but it is not proof that every generated update will preserve populated text.

For reliable issue-closing behavior, keep Fixes #123/Closes #123 in a human-controlled PR body or add it after Copilot opens the draft. Treat automatic PR-body generation as editable output, not a durable reference store. If an agent later rewrites the body, restore the links before merge.

So the supported split is:

• path-specific instructions: file-scoped implementation guidance;
• repository-wide instructions/task prompt: task-wide guidance;
• PR references that must survive: verify or maintain them explicitly in the PR body.

The docs currently do not promise preservation of arbitrary PR-body text across Copilot updates, so a reproducible deletion should be reported as product feedback rather than worked around with a broader glob.